Archive

Quotes

Every country has the government it deserves.

—Joseph de Maistre, 1811

The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all.

—G.K. Chesterton, 1908

The best of all rulers is but a shadowy presence to his subjects.

—Laozi

It is impossible to tell which of the two dispositions we find in men is more harmful in a republic, that which seeks to maintain an established position or that which has none but seeks to acquire it.

—Niccolò Machiavelli, c. 1515

My people and I have come to an agreement that satisfies us both. They are to say what they please, and I am to do what I please.

—Frederick the Great, c. 1770

What experience and history teach is this—that nations and governments have never learned anything from history or acted upon any lessons they might have drawn from it.

—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, 1830

A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always count on the support of Paul.

—George Bernard Shaw, 1944

I say violence is necessary. It is as American as cherry pie.

—H. Rap Brown, 1967

O citizens, first acquire wealth; you can practice virtue afterward.

—Horace, c. 8 BC

I shall be an autocrat: that’s my trade. And the good Lord will forgive me: that’s his.

—Catherine the Great, c. 1796

The vice presidency isn’t worth a pitcher of warm piss.

—John Nance Garner, c. 1967

Why has the government been instituted at all? Because the passions of men will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice without constraint.

—Alexander Hamilton, 1787

All the ills of democracy can be cured by more democracy.

—Al Smith, 1933